Sunday, June 20, 2010

NAPLAN - Monday 7th June 2010

The Deputy Prime Minister and minister45 for Education is puffing her chest out as kids around Australia put their heads down and do their NAPLAN tests.

I had to Google what 'NAPLAN' stands for - National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy.

It's typical, pick on something professors of education and nerds around the country would feel was a pushover.

They don't give a stuff about art, wit, humour, physical activity, personal development, music, dance, woodwork, cooking, ... Neither do the teachers they train not the principals who supervise them.

It's why by the time kids reach the last year of high school they're dull and depressed.

How good an education do you think school children are getting if those who teach them do not have a good command of the basic physical skills, like, running, jumping, throwing, catching, kicking, skipping, rolling, hanging, climbing, swimming ...

Here's the NAPPE - National Assessment Program - PhysEd - a list of some of the key motor skills that I reckon form a basic foundation of motor skill development and physical fitness. They’re the sorts of activities that kids at age 12 and teachers of any age can do, if they’re reasonably well trained.

Run your eye over the list of skills and see how many of them you can still do. If you can make the grade, I’ll take my hat off to you. If the teachers you know can make the grade I’ll take my hat off to them as well.

Juggle three balls

Skip with a rope

Do a good 30 seconds worth of double under skips.

Run 40, 20m laps in 5 minutes

Do 20 good situps

Do 20 good pressups

Do 5 good chinups

Sitting down, reach forward and get your wrists past your toes

Sit down and stand up 10 times in 30 seconds

Keep a yo yo going up and down for 30 seconds

Throw a ball 20m

Hop 20m on one leg, and then the other

Catch a tennis ball from 10m

Throw a tennis ball up in the air and clap 10 times before it comes down – and catch it.

Put a bean bag between your heels and kick it over your head

Swim 50 metres in less than a minute.

Duck dive and swim 5 metres under water

Dive into the water from a height of a metre- or more

Swing on a horizontal bar

Swing across a monkey bar.

Put one leg over the horizontal bar and swing up into a sitting position

Hang by your legs from a horizontal bar - swing and land on your feet.

Pat a tennis ball with your hand

Pat a ball with a wooden bat or tennis racquet, flat on and also on the side.

Crab walk for 10 metres

Lie on your back and put your feet up over your head and onto the floor behind you

Do a forward roll

Do a backward roll

Do a frog balance

Do a cartwheel

Do a 5 second handstand

Hit a ball against a wall for 30 seconds using a bat – forehand and backhand from 5 metres

Climb up a rope

Ride a bike, no hands ...

And there must be dozens more things that kids ought to be able to do that suggest fitness and motor skill proficiency. If you can think of some, send me an email.

On the trackOut with the boys at 6.45.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and let me know how you go on the NAPPE.

John Millerwww.millerhealth.com.auwww.fitandhealthyonline.comwww.globalbackcare.comwww.crookback.com.au